Ladies Footwork

Generally, I don't take great exception to footwork but there just seems to have been a real explosion of interesting footwork this season. Especially the straight line sequences of Michelle and Sasha in both their short and long programs. Who has the best footwork of the ladies this season?

Michelle

After watching all of the Grand Prix events I was most impressed with Sasha's footwork sequences. They are quite difficult and executed with a lot of speed. I was also impressed with Michelle's footwork in her technical program at Skate America, but didn't get the same feeling from the footwork in "Aranjuez". Michelle really must have worked on both of the sequences a great amount from October until the January Nationals because they both were incredible, most notably in the long program. She moved through it with incredible flow and spark, completely eclipsing any doubt I had about it at Skate America. I would now say she has the footwork to beat. Sasha's is wonderful, but compared to Michelle's it seems too choppy. She tears through it with wild speed which is commendable difficulty wise, but I'd enjoy it more if there was a higher level of convincing emotion. Maybe she should actually slow it down a bit, LOL!

Re: Michelle

IMHO, Sasha's footwork stops way too much. Does stopping make it difficult? I think it just destroys the flow of the program somewhat. Michelles is definately better this year, best overall. Fumie's footwork has flow and speed...she's the only one who does circular footwork well. I liked Irina's one foot footwork better than hers this year.

Re: Michelle

Re: Michelle

I voted for Michelle - she does hers with such ease you barely notice she's doing it. Sasha's is great but it looks like its still a challenge to her and she seems to have to concentrate more while MK flows through it much easier.

Re: Sasha

<span style="color:blue;font-family:comic sans ms;font-size:x-small;"><strong>Sasha's footwork is the best. Sasha had it first and Michelle's IMO looks like a cheap carbon copy of Sasha's</strong></span>

Re: Sasha

Re: Sasha

<span style="color:navy;font-family:georgia;font-size:small;">No one talked about Michelle's footwork before Sasha started doing hers. That's because Michelle didn't have an obvious footwork sequence--one of those "I am now doing footwork" segments. Sasha's is more complex but I like Michelle's as well.</span>

Re: Sasha

actually many skating fans have talked about MK's footwook sequences before this season.

I remember ppl talking about MK's DOD footwork as being one of the most complex and fast circular fw sequences. Then there was The Red Violin where ppl were amazed at the FW, then at 2002 Nats where MK surprised everyone with the speed and depthness of her FW in Schez.

I think the only reason why ppl were talking about Sasha's fw before MK's was b/c nobody saw Michelle's SA SP until months after on the internet. Even before we saw it, many judges and ppl who were there were raving about "TFB" fw. Her LP "Aranjuez" wasn't close to being finished and she was obviously still working on the program, so her FW wasn't spectacular there.

I'm not bashing Sasha b/c her FW is good. I don't think it's that complex b/c although she does do more moves than MK, her *extra* moves are basically the same toe pick moves just repeated many times after some stops. MK seems to be doing different sort of turns and kicks and toe while doing hers w/o repeating as much and without stops.